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Angled stands - bad for the drives?
- Thread starter Fujikon
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For most desktop hard drives, the drives must be mounted so that the platters are either in a horizontal or vertical plane. Laptop drives may have a little more latitude for occasional in-between angles, but for long term fixed operation, the laptop should be mounted in a horizontal, or vertical position. A few degrees off won't hurt anything, but 45* is a definite no-no.
Have been using it for couple of months now and no effects at all as HD is functioning well.
I've been using my mStand for two or three years now and the hard drive is still ok.
Same here. No problems. Optical drive is a little temperamental at times but I don't think that's to do with the stand... I think it's just knackered.
J
Checking with the Western Digital website, it appears that there are no specific restrictions mentioned about mobile hard drive mounting angles. However, the 3.5" desktop drives are still limited to right side up, upside down, or vertical on any edge. This is probably due to the heavier platter and spindle assemblies on 3.5" drives.
I don't know where people get these crazy ideas about only keeping drives vertical or horizontal. There is no requirement nor need to keep hard drives at any particular orientation. None
Somebody asked this question on Tekzilla and if I remember right, the fluid bearings that modern drives use are not affected by the angle which was news to me at the time. My optical drives sounds like it's grinding up a disc if I angle my MBP even a little bit though and I'm not sure what kind of bearings that uses.
People used to run with iPods containing mechanical drives.
And I can't remember reading that the iPod Classic must be kept in a certain position...
Ipod drives are designed to be used in any position since they are designed to be small and portable.
But I don't see any reason that any drive shouldn't be operated at an arbitrary angle between horizontal and vertical. Even optical drives, the only time I could see one having a problem is past vertical (upside-down) since the mechanism holding the disk on the spindle usually isn't very strong.
Changing the orientation of a disk while it is spinning is of course very bad because that will put gyroscopic force on the platter.
But I don't see any reason that any drive shouldn't be operated at an arbitrary angle between horizontal and vertical. Even optical drives, the only time I could see one having a problem is past vertical (upside-down) since the mechanism holding the disk on the spindle usually isn't very strong.
Changing the orientation of a disk while it is spinning is of course very bad because that will put gyroscopic force on the platter.
A optical drive has a lot more 'jitter' when its not in a horizontal position. This could lead to possible read/write errors.
They did a test in the PC Magazine a couple of years ago and the effect was negligible, so no real danger to the drive itself.
You should of course not move it around to roughly.
Just enjoy your Macbook Pro.